chapter02 · 037-ep37
Episode 37: Kaiju Battle and a Classic Punchline
【What NOW!?】
【Does the second wave usually come this fast!?】
【Isn't the second wave from a dungeon with deep layers what destroyed a city back then!?】
CRRRRUNCH!
The center of the construction-restricted zone swelled like the surface of the sea. An immense torrent of mana surged upward—not from the dungeon itself, but from the murderous aura of a single monster.
"This won't do, desu wa."
CLACK! Karin reacted at once. She raised her two heavy magical Gatling guns, creations of <Divine Artisan>, and poured massive amounts of mana into them again.
"FIRE, DESU WAAAA!"
DAGAGAGAGAGAGAGAGAGAGAGAGAGAGA!!!!
She concentrated the excessive barrage that had slaughtered the horde on a single target. But—DOGOOOOOOON!
Her shots were blown away, along with the swelling ground.
A gigantic monster tore through the earth and dungeon walls.
"OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOH!"
Black scales. Blood-red eyes. A neck rising as high as a multistory building. Its roar shook the air, and an armor of violent wind surrounded its body, repelling Karin's continuing barrage completely.
The Storm Dragon. A genuine monster ruling the depths of the dungeon had appeared on the surface.
【Huh...?】
【A dragon...?】
【You've gotta be kidding!?】
【We'd practically won a second ago!?】
【What IS that wind!?】
【All Karin ojou-sama's shots are bouncing off!?】
【Magic!?】
【A dragon with magical abilities means...】
【No no no no no!?】
【This can't be real...】
【A deep-layer boss!?】
Chat wasn't alone in its despair. Those on-site who could sense its power felt worse than the people watching through a screen. The dragon's impossible mana, disaster-like ability, and sheer superiority as a living creature made even the responding explorers and Kagerou blanch.
"H-hey, you little shit! We can't take THAT! Forget this zero-casualty crap and cover a retreat!"
Kagerou knew the deep layers' dangers better than anyone there. He'd entered them once, brimming with confidence, and fled defeated within ten minutes. He'd had the bad luck to run straight into one of their strongest ordinary monsters, the sort even Black Tiger veterans struggled with. But their encounter was the unlucky part; his defeat was simply because he wasn't strong enough. Even the strongest young explorer had been helpless against an ordinary inhabitant of the 'other world' that was the deep layers.
A deep-layer boss dwarfed even that monster. It was a living calamity beyond hordes of the magical life-forms dwelling there. One person couldn't possibly kill it—not here in Shibuya, with zero casualties. Karin's powerful barrage couldn't even reach its scales through the wind armor. Both guards also urged her to save whoever she could and wait for reinforcements.
But while common sense screamed at her—
"I see. An armor of wind. I could defeat it firing like this, but deflected shots would endanger the surroundings. And against that size and area attack, taking too long would be unwise. To keep casualties at zero, I must kill it instantly. In that case... that weapon is ideal."
Karin showed no fear. She immediately set aside both Gatling guns and thrust her hand back into her mouth.
"Huh...?" Kagerou and the others stared.
"Getting this one out is difficult... Uegh—BLUUUURGH."
What she pulled out was an even larger mass of iron: an enormous, super-heavy magical weapon. She equipped a massive pile bunker on each arm.
【Wait】
【What's she got NOW!?】
【What is going on inside Karin-sama's mouth!?】
【Slime-covered again lmao】
【Your face looked awful just then, Karin ojou-sama!?】
【Those things are HUGE...】
【She's switching weapons? She's really going to fight!?】
Each gigantic fist held an iron stake propelled by prodigious mana. They looked like someone had torn the arms off a giant robot and turned them into weapons. Karin lifted them easily.
"Then let's settle this in a flash!"
She sped away, leaving a stunned Kagerou and the guards behind.
WHOOSH! WHOOSH! KRA-WHOOSH!
She moved too quickly for them to call her back, accelerating every time she kicked a crater into the ground. Yet something reacted to her missile-like charge.
"GRUOOOOOOOOOOOH!"
The storm dragon, a pinnacle species that could surely treat the great serpent as small fry, tracked the racing ojou-sama perfectly.
DOGOOOOOOOOON!
It struck Karin, now quite close, with a tornado breath attack that had almost no tell—a blow like a condensed storm. Though aimed at the ground, it shattered every window in a building three hundred meters away and sent evacuees around the perimeter flying with its mere aftershock.
【!?】
【Did it just fire a breath attack!?】
【What WAS that!?】
【Everything went flying!?】
Even viewers watching from a distance through Kagerou's body cam couldn't grasp an attack on that scale. Anyone caught at the point of impact would be obliterated. Normally.
"As expected of the deep layers. What a mighty wind."
Karin had read and parried the attack, then used its aftermath to leap into the air.
"GRUAAAAAAH!"
The lord of the deep layers wasn't surprised. It fired its nearly instantaneous wind breath again at Karin, now suspended in midair.
"How convenient that you've aimed your breath into the sky, where it cannot catch anyone else."
Her dress flared as though she were dancing.
"A head-on contest, desu wa!"
With her pile bunker, monstrous as the arm of a powered suit, Karin punched the deep-layer boss's breath. Mana collided; the air shook.
【!?】
【When did she get up there!?】
【How'd she evade that first breath!?】
【SHE'S PUNCHING THE DRAGON'S BREATH!?】
【GOOOOO! I don't even understand anymore but GOOOOOO!】
【BEAT IT!】
【GO, OJOU-SAMAAAA!】
KRA-BOOOOM!
As though answering chat's cheers, she pierced the concentrated storm. Its fragments scattered across the sky, threatening to change the weather.
"ORAAAAAA!"
"GRUOOOOH!?"
The pile bunker broke through the breath and the wind armor, slamming into the dragon's face. And naturally that wasn't the end of the attack.
"HAAAAAAAAH!"
KRA-THOOM!!
"K—!?"
A thick iron stake fired from the weapon in response to Karin's massive mana. From point-blank range, the wind armor was useless. The blow smashed the dragon into the earth and wrung a voiceless cry from it. Gravely wounded, it could no longer maintain its armor at full strength.
【SHE PUNCHED THROUGH THE BREATH!?】
【GOOOOO, OJOU-SAMAAAA!】
【IT'S WORKING ON A DEEP-LAYER BOSS!?】
"I have another fist, you know!"
Karin drew back the second pile bunker. Her strongest close-range attack: a punch that fired its stake at the moment of impact. She drove that double blow into the grounded dragon's body, with nowhere for the force to escape.
KRA-THOOOOOM!!!!
"GRUOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOH!?"
Its scream and the impact shook the earth. A huge crater formed in the already ruined ground; the shaking was so fierce it felt like another collapse. Then silence fell.
"There. Subjugation complete, desu wa!"
As the dust cleared, Karin's voice rang quietly across the area. She stood looking up at the storm dragon's remains, a vast hole through its belly.
【WHAAAAAAAAA!?】
【SHE REALLY DID IT!?】
【ARE YOU SERIOUS!?】
【KARIN OJOU-SAMAAAA!】
【A DEEP-LAYER BOSS!?】
【THAT FAKE OJOU-SAMA'S WAY TOO STRONG!】
【Zero deaths in a disaster like that!? Against a deep-layer boss!?】
【She's beyond just a dungeon streamer. This ojou-sama's the best!】
【Her serious face when she forgets she's on camera is so hot I'm actually getting wet】
【Karin onee-sama...】
One million concurrents. Comments flooded Kagerou's channel until the screen began to freeze in earnest. But Kagerou himself couldn't care less about his numbers. His eyes saw only the absurd achievement of the idiot who'd saved everyone.
"...Haha. You're ridiculous, you little shit."
Watching Karin stand amid the wasteland, he looked like a child dazzled by his first anime.
That didn't mean he'd repented or become a good person. He remained arrogant, rough, disliked, and unconcerned with inconveniencing others. He'd grown bitter at how far the real top explorers were beyond him, drowned himself in streaming numbers, and turned to nuisance stunts when those numbers slowed. That much about him hadn't changed.
But he probably wouldn't make those worthless streams anymore.
"Hah. What a pain... Guess I'll start training from zero."
For in that moment, he'd found himself admiring the mad monster wiping her brow in satisfaction.
"Good. It's completely settled now."
While everyone else remained stunned, Karin examined the mana escaping the dungeon and nodded. She'd never seen a collapse before, so she couldn't be certain—but the flow had weakened dramatically. No more monsters would emerge, and the dungeon should repair itself. Reinforcements were coming; they could handle the details.
"Oh! I cut the stream so suddenly. My viewers must be worried."
She brought out her floating camera and tidied her appearance. She'd gotten dusty in the fight, but a little brushing off made her presentable.
"Urgh-gh-gh. Bweh... This storage skill really is inconvenient."
Her face contorted as she swallowed the gigantic pile bunkers again. She carefully put on the ornament 'given' by Setsuna-sama and reproduced in real life, then restarted the stream as though <Internal Storage> had never existed.
"Let's see... Ah, it's connected! Um, the camera suddenly malfunctioned and the stream ended, but don't worry, everyone, desu wa! Some people were injured, so we mustn't be careless, but thankfully no one died. Thanks to my Elegant, refined fighting and the explorers who came to help, the Shibuya dungeon collapse has been contained. There's no cause for concern!"
She delivered the lines she'd rehearsed while fixing her appearance, chest proudly out. But chat seemed strange.
【lol】
【lol】
【She did all THAT in public and she's still trying to cover it up lmao】
【She's a terrible actor, and she doesn't even know we've already seen it all. 'Elegant fighting' lol】
【And she already said 'today's stream ends here' when she cut it, but she's forgotten lol】
【Our lovable liar lmao】
【ojou-sama world's coolest liar】
【Saving everyone in Shibuya WAS Elegant... Refined, though? Well...】
【I'm glad she's back to her usual self lol】
【She went from her badass serious face right back to our silly ojou-sama lol】
【Karin ojou-sama! THIS camera was running the whole time! → Kagerou's channel URL】
【Clips are already spreading. Almost 300k views!】
【Lying won't help!】
"Eh...?"
Karin's face went blank. She opened the link—and watched herself pull the Gatling guns out of her mouth.
SCHLOOOOOORP!
"UWAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!?"
The woman who hadn't flinched at a deep-layer dragon's breath screamed and fell over.
【lol】
【An entire lmao farm】
【Grass grew back like when the Forest Spirit disappeared lol】
【Is THIS the hero who saved Shibuya...?】
【Poor Karin ojou-sama...】
【Okay, I actually feel bad for her lmao】
【We should all report and take down the clips of her pulling weapons out of her mouth. Everything else can spread far and wide, though lol】
【Agreed, we'll try to get those removed!】
【Though it's probably way too late...】
【Thug Ojou-sama, Fist-Fuck Ojou-sama... This girl was born under that kind of star lol】
【Congrats, Kagerou! Your revenge succeeded lol】
"!? Huh!? No, I didn't—!?"
Kagerou protested, but he'd filmed her entire battle while standing there dazed. Too embarrassed to approach her after everything, he apologized silently to the Karin collapsed in the distance.
And so an unprecedented sixteen-year-old explorer, Karin Yamada, had completely suppressed a catastrophe that should have caused unheard-of damage. The incredible footage was broadcast repeatedly on the news. Her channel grew even faster, reaching a staggering four million subscribers the next day.
――――――――――――――――――――――――――――――――
That brings the great disaster to a close for now.
Coming up, we'll have a Mafuyu Sasaki episode and a somewhat unusual forum episode before moving into a full-scale confrontation with the corrupt clan Black Tiger.
If you enjoyed it, please support the story with the stars below or a follow from the right-hand menu so more people can read it!
(I laughed at how many stars came in after my request in episode 35. You really want to spread Lord Vomit's disgrace! Thank you so much!)